No. 18 Stanford earns a C- in road loss to Washington

Attaching super-sized significance to the outcome of one game is as much a part of the college football season as BCS controversy.

Stanford looked like a top-10 team against USC and a top-50 team against Washington.

The truth is probably in the middle.

The defense is very good but not quite dominant. The offense is . . . erratic? . . . mediocre? . . . limited?

That's essentially how everyone viewed the Cardinal coming into the season -- the reason Stanford was projected to win eight games, give or take, in the post-Luck era.

Result: Lost at Washington 17-13.

Grade: C-

Comment: Grade is a combination of an F for the offense (no touchdowns, no running game, dropped passes, etc.) and a B for the defense, which dominated for most of three quarters then allowed two game-changing plays.

Since the first week of training camp, coach David Shaw has gone out of his way to praise the receivers at every opportunity.

He's a fairly straight shooter as coaches go, which tells me the unit must be playing reasonably well in practice.

But the games are another matter -- as they have been since the beginning of last season.

Ty Montgomery caught six passes and dropped three. Two of the drops were well-thrown deep balls by Josh Nunes that could have changed the game (and reminiscent of Chris Owusu's slippery fingers).

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None of the other receivers caught a pass.

Without breaking down film on a route-by-route basis, it's difficult to know if they aren't getting separation, if they run inefficient routes, if Nunes does a poor job locating them . . . or a combination thereof.

But the bottom line is that the unit -- and I'm including Montgomery, because of his drops -- has made little tangible progress on Saturdays.

The Nunes we saw against Washington is the same Nunes we've seen all season, with the exception of a few stellar plays in the fourth quarter of the USC game.

In fact, he completed a higher percentage of passes against UW (48.6) than he did against USC (46.8).

He threw one-hoppers prior to the UW game and he threw one-hoppers against the Huskies.

It's the same Nunes I saw in the spring practices and training camp scrimmages that were open to the media.

Bottom line: It's who he is at this point in his career.

Stanford's season will be defined by 1) how much Nunes improves over time, and 2) how consistently Shaw and offensive coordinator Pep Hamilton put Nunes, with his skill set, in positions to succeed.

The coaches had it relatively easy for three years with you-know-who.

Along those lines . . .

Stanford's postgame comments centered on lack of execution and getting outplayed, but let's make no mistake: The Cardinal was out-coached, as well.

UW defensive coordinator Justin Wilcox loaded the box to stuff the running game and force Stanford into long-yardage situations.

The Cardinal responded with a noticeable lack of creativity: Very little in the way of trick plays or misdirection to counteract the hard-charging UW defense.

Instead, we saw the staples: Stepfan Taylor between the tackles, short crossing passes, the long sideline lob pass to Levine Toilolo.

Yes, it tried a screen pass to Taylor, but it was the same screen Stanford used against USC and the Huskies pounced.

Tight end Zach Ertz was terrific, but his effectiveness was limited to the middle of the field. Stanford again failed to convert red-zone opportunities into touchdowns and is 5 of 13 on the season (38 percent).

Three other quick points:

1. Don't know if it was called from the sideline or if Nunes changed into it, but the fourth-and-4 pass on the final drive (to Toilolo) was far too risky given the situation.

2. The delay-of-game penalties must be eliminated.

Game-management issues were understandable in Week 1, but we're a month into the season.

3. You'd better believe every defensive coordinator in the conference will study UW's game plan and try to replicate it.

Some teams probably won't have the personnel to pull it off. Some teams have better personnel than the Huskies.

But everyone associated with the Cardinal offense -- players and coaches -- must do a better job.

Next up: vs. Arizona.

The matchup: Favorable for Stanford.

Arizona uses the spread option and has a big-play tailback (Ka'Deem Carey) and a capable quarterback (Matt Scott).

It's nothing Stanford's defense can't handle, if it plays with requisite discipline and tackles well in the open field.

(Speaking of: Look for the Wildcats to throw the same hitch pass to receiver Dan Buckner that UW's Kasen Williams turned into a touchdown by running through Terrence Brown's tackle.)

On the other side of the ball . . .

Arizona plays a 3-3-5 defense that's fast but not overly physical, as we saw Saturday:

Oregon State, which is comparable to Stanford in its ground-and-pound approach, rushed for 180 yards against the Wildcats.

Of course, OSU quarterback Sean Mannion (one of the best in the Pac-12) and his talented receivers were able to convert play-action opportunities when Arizona overplayed the running game.

Stanford must do the same, or it could be close into the fourth quarter.

The Cardinal is favored by 12, which feels a tad high given that it has scored more than 21 points once in four games.